The Future American Police State

[nbcrusader]

I think it is an extreme minority that believe they can influence or "trigger" end times.

Every Christian should have a basic knowledge of prophecy and end times as part of knowing God's Word. The mistake comes when we try to match names, number, times and events to the events described in Scripture - which directly warns us against making such predictions.

Government policy to trigger the Second Coming?

[oliveu2cm]

Originally posted by melon


Yup...we're on the same page.

Melon

But wouldn't this be unholy? Unchristian? Just plain wrong???

[melon]

Originally posted by nbcrusader
Government policy to trigger the Second Coming?

I've kept my George H.W. Bush quote in my signature for a reason. Remember the 1992 election when Bush, Sr. lost and Clinton was reelected? The immediate anger emanating from the extreme Christian right led me to believe that, perhaps, they were angry that their "agenda" was going to be thwarted. Hence, the immediate calls to "Impeach Clinton" in 1993. With Bush, Jr. in office, I feel that the extreme Christian right is taking off right where they left off, and a global war--hence, the "war on terrorism"--might be enough to finish their agenda to bring on the Rapture. This administration, perhaps, is uninterested in peace, just because of this.

It is my view that there are many prominent extremists in the Bush, Jr. administration, who--right or wrong--are wishing to advance the end of the world. And you are correct, nbcrusader, the Bible does warn against trying to make such predictions for the end of the world. Unfortunately, we may have to learn the hard way why separation of church and state has always been necessary.

Anyhow, these are some random thoughts. I'm likely to change my mind on this.

Melon

[melon]

Originally posted by oliveu2cm
But wouldn't this be unholy? Unchristian? Just plain wrong???

I agree. The greatest evil of them all is disguised in holiness.

Melon

[boywonder]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by melon


Is it? I think the Republican Party has done an excellent job of stacking this "war on terrorism" to a point that no "real" American should question it. It should be noted that, with the creation of the Homeland Security department that the Republican Party filibustered the bill 12 times before the election--only to blame delays on the "unpatriotic" Democrats during the campaign. A brilliantly Machiavellian tactic.

I don't recall this tactic being used that often. In fact, I recall one candidate using it as he was campaigning during the midterm elections and the Democrats made a big stink over Republican's capitalizing on the war on terror. I don't see how you can argue that the administration has prevented people from criticizing it, when all the liberal pundits have done nothing but criticize starting from a month after 9-11.

Remember, Daschle kept pushing further and further to see whether he could pin the events of 9-11 on the current administration, but he failed because the evidence wasn't there and Clinton had as much (if not more) blame than Bush. Then, of course, you have every liberal pundit constantly attacking the administration including: Bill Maher, Ted Rall, Arianna Huffington, Michael Moore, etc etc. Then, you have every liberal site and forum on the web going crazy pinning all kinds of conspiracy theories on Bush. You have members of his own party doubting his war plans on Iraq. Clearly, I haven't heard anyone (of consequence) tell these pundits that they're not "real" Americans. I think it's a mostly imagined persecution on the part of liberals. The only time I can of where it was "unAmerican" to question the President, was just a few months after the attack when the country was trying to unite. Seems like a ton of dissent to me. Machiavelli would have been ashamed. "Machiavelian"? Practicing those alternatives to N*zism already?

Also, I wouldn't mock the process of filibustering, because it seems likely that Democrats are going to have to revert to it as a recourse in the Congress. That might come back to bite you in the ass.


Of course, "1984" was a scathing critique of Soviet communism, but I would also argue that the "choice" in capitalism is little more than an illusion. We used to chuckle at the fact that the government owned all the property in communism; but, in America, if you don't pay your property "taxes," the government can come in and take it all away. In effect, we are renting our property from our government...so much for "ownership."

You also have to pay taxes on fast food and other purchases. Are we not the owners of that? I hope we are because it's going to be hard to vomit up that BLT I ate in the early 90's if the tax man cometh. We pay taxes for marriage too. That means that the government can regulate who gets married! We pay taxes on our income and not paying those taxes can lead to jail time! The government can literally put you in jail for not paying them money. Seriously, it seems that if you're a liberal (or have some liberal ideas), then you shouldn't be attacking property tax (or any tax), because taxes are going to pay for social programs and the government isn't exactly in a budget surplus period. This is NOT the choice that we're supposed to find in capitalism. It isn't the choice to take advantage of this country's resources and not pay for any of it. It's the choice of religion, political affialiation\idealogy, etc etc.

The "dirty" fact of the Orwellian nightmare is that its success is dependent on the ignorance of the populace--a reinvention of history ("our Founding Fathers were Christians") and semantical games (Department of "Homeland Security"). Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past. And it is no secret that the Roman "Republic" mutated into an autocratic "Empire."

And do not think it impossible to monitor all electronic communications simultaneously and globally...

Melon

That's not the "dirty" fact of an Orwellian nightmare. It's the most obvious fact. Remember the book? They had ministries to take care of that. I believe it was called the ministry of truth or something to that effect. A "dirty" little secret is something that ISN'T obvious on first inspection. Still, I don't believe that the government can effectively monitor the many terabytes of information passed per second around the global web.

1 character = 1 byte
Terabyte= 1,099,511,627,776 bytes

If you consider all the different encryption schemes, operating systems, proxy servers, etc etc, it doesn't add up. That's just internet traffic! Not considering telephone, snail mail, etc.
It's unlikely that the government will be able to convict someone based on tracing them across the internet if they (the suspects) can make a viable arguement that someone else could have been using their computer. Most intelligent people use anonymous proxy servers to do their "bad deeds" on the internet anyways.

[melon]

Originally posted by boywonder
I don't recall this tactic being used that often.

I guess if we aren't glued to C-SPAN, we'll never see it.

[QUOTE][B]Clearly, I haven't heard anyone (of consequence) tell these pundits that they're not "real" Americans. I think it's a mostly imagined persecution on the part of liberals. The only time I can of where it was "unAmerican" to question the President, was just a few months after the attack when the country was trying to unite. Seems like a ton of dissent to me. Machiavelli would have been ashamed. "Machiavelian"? Practicing those alternatives to N*zism already?

Also, I wouldn't mock the process of filibustering, because it seems likely that Democrats are going to have to revert to it as a recourse in the Congress.

Pay attention. I wasn't mocking it. It only seems odd that a party would filibuster its own idea, and then blame it on the other side. Politics, anyone?

You also have to pay taxes on fast food and other purchases. Are we not the owners of that?

I think this is a flat out silly comparison. You pay taxes on food *once* and its yours. You pay property taxes *every* year. They never end, and, as such, you never own your property.

We pay taxes for marriage too. That means that the government can regulate who gets married! We pay taxes on our income and not paying those taxes can lead to jail time! The government can literally put you in jail for not paying them money. Seriously, it seems that if you're a liberal (or have some liberal ideas), then you shouldn't be attacking property tax (or any tax), because taxes are going to pay for social programs and the government isn't exactly in a budget surplus period.

First off, "boywonder," I'm not some archetypical liberal. I'm against property taxes, but am for graduated income taxes. I am for modifying sales taxes, so that they are required to be included in the sticker price of the item, rather than added after when at the cash register. I'm for modifying capital gains taxes, so that those who own their property non-speculatively (in other words, you aren't in it for the short-term "capital gains"), aren't taxed it. I think that schools should be funded at the state level, rather than the local level, with all public schools getting equal funding. No more "rich" and "poor" school districts.

In fact, my beef with the Republican Party is that they are fiscally irresponsible, slashing taxes for the top 1% with one hand and spending us into oblivion with the newest military toys in the other. If I had the chance to be in the presidency, I would reduce spending, pay off the national debt, and then cut taxes immensely.

We have too much of a bureaucracy, and we're bleeding at the seams. I think we should be upset that nearly 15% of our national budget every year goes to national debt payments...and that should increase, due to the Bush Administration's fiscal irresponsibility with the last tax cut.

But I digress...

This is NOT the choice that we're supposed to find in capitalism. It isn't the choice to take advantage of this country's resources and not pay for any of it. It's the choice of religion, political affialiation\idealogy, etc etc.

Yes..."choice." And how funny how all the "choices" cost the same. How all cars have similar frames and guts to them. How all television shows follow the same formula. How the Democratic Party and the Republican Party are fairly similar in practice, when you cut out all the campaign rhetoric. Yes..."choice."

That's not the "dirty" fact of an Orwellian nightmare. It's the most obvious fact.

True enough, but this is a semantical argument on your part.

1 character = 1 byte
Terabyte= 1,099,511,627,776 bytes

If you consider all the different encryption schemes, operating systems, proxy servers, etc etc, it doesn't add up. That's just internet traffic! Not considering telephone, snail mail, etc.
It's unlikely that the government will be able to convict someone based on tracing them across the internet if they (the suspects) can make a viable arguement that someone else could have been using their computer. Most intelligent people use anonymous proxy servers to do their "bad deeds" on the internet anyways.

Ha! If you go by PC standards, then, yes, it would be difficult to process all those terabytes. However, top of the line supercomputers can process this nearly effortlessly. Now link hundreds of these together.

Proxy servers are useless if all of them are being monitored. A proxy server still has to hook up to the internet backbone--just as all internet traffic does. Telephony is also easy to monitor with the right equipment at the central office. The sheer reality is that, due to the fact that all electromagnetic waves travel at or near the speed of light, you could have all of your traffic routed to a monitoring site, then en route to you, without you ever noticing.

Snail mail is different, because it is not an electronic mode of communication.

Melon

[bonosloveslave]

Originally posted by Zoomerang96
next thing you know, everyone will be expected to have a computer chip inserted into their bodies for the sake of national security, and those that would be opposed to it will be viewed as "terrorists."

i too love what is happening in the name of national security.

I think this is a very definite possibility, and that kind of scenario (for me, anyways) gets too close to the prophesy of the "mark of the beast" - and for that reason I would never stand to have a chip implanted in me. And I could very much could see the terrorist accusation being thrown at people who refuse to take part - very scary, but I bet it's coming.


Also, I don't see how it is possible for us to "induce" the Rapture/2nd Coming - God will use people when the time is right, and this could be coming up on the right time, but it is all under His control, our wishing and pushing is not going to make it happen any sooner.

[pub crawler]

Originally posted by nbcrusader


Government policy to trigger the Second Coming?

Sure, why not?

[boywonder]

I guess if we aren't glued to C-SPAN, we'll never see it.

You'll never see it because it's imagined. It's a common thing for a group to exagerate persecution for political gain. Jesse would be proud.

Pay attention. I wasn't mocking it. It only seems odd that a party would filibuster its own idea, and then blame it on the other side. Politics, anyone?

I don't believe the Republicans were filibustering their own bill. They didn't like the version the Democrats wanted. Politics, anyone? Are you kidding me? Yeah, liberals are never guilty of politics. Psst.

I think this is a flat out silly comparison. You pay taxes on food *once* and its yours. You pay property taxes *every* year. They never end, and, as such, you never own your property.

First off, "boywonder," I'm not some archetypical liberal. I'm against property taxes, but am for graduated income taxes. I am for modifying sales taxes, so that they are required to be included in the sticker price of the item, rather than added after when at the cash register. I'm for modifying capital gains taxes, so that those who own their property non-speculatively (in other words, you aren't in it for the short-term "capital gains"), aren't taxed it. I think that schools should be funded at the state level, rather than the local level, with all public schools getting equal funding. No more "rich" and "poor" school districts.

Granted that taxes are paid up front on food, but your reasoning that the government has too much power because of property taxes is silly considering you could also make the same arguement for marriage and income (arguements you conveniently ignored). If I made a fortune from an invention and the government took half of my profits, then why not criticize the government for being too powerful there? Because the mean inventor was hording all his profits and not giving it away to the poor like he should have?

In fact, my beef with the Republican Party is that they are fiscally irresponsible, slashing taxes for the top 1% with one hand and spending us into oblivion with the newest military toys in the other. If I had the chance to be in the presidency, I would reduce spending, pay off the national debt, and then cut taxes immensely.

The top 1% of income earners already pay a record-high 35% of federal taxes, according to the Joint Economic Committee. And the top 25%–which means those making more than $50,607 per year–pay 83% of all taxes. Thus, any cut, no matter how small, must of necessity benefit those who pay most of the nation’s bills. Our government is not Robin Hood. Our government is not Robin Hood. Say it with me now.....

Charging that the Republicans are responsible for too much government spending is just ridiculous. We didn't have a surplus in the 90's because Clinton was a great fiscal manager. Liberals love to spend government $$$ on social programs and these programs are ripe with bureaucracy. Let's not deny it.

Yes..."choice." And how funny how all the "choices" cost the same. How all cars have similar frames and guts to them. How all television shows follow the same formula. How the Democratic Party and the Republican Party are fairly similar in practice, when you cut out all the campaign rhetoric. Yes..."choice."

Television shows don't follow the same formula. Some sitcoms perhaps, but that's an oversimplification. Cars look similar so we are actually not choosing? Please. A pinto is not a Lamborghini. I don't think Republicans and Democrats are the same. Perhaps you weren't paying attention to the issues. Do you really think Gore would be doing the same thing Bush is now? Please, any Democrats who believe this, please raise your hands. Would we have a tax cut, a war with Iraq, etc etc? No way.

True enough, but this is a semantical argument on your part.

Not a semantical arguement on MY part. This is common sense to anyone who read the book and knows what a "dirty" little secret is.

Ha! If you go by PC standards, then, yes, it would be difficult to process all those terabytes. However, top of the line supercomputers can process this nearly effortlessly. Now link hundreds of these together.

Any proof of this? You didn't address the issue of encryption methods, etc.

Proxy servers are useless if all of them are being monitored. A proxy server still has to hook up to the internet backbone--just as all internet traffic does.

An anonymous proxy server is just that...anonymous. The person who runs the proxy server retains (or chooses not to retain) the logs of what IP addresses were receiving what packets. Most proxy servers are used solely for the purpose of illegal distribution of files, so I don't suspect these are the type of people who want to help out the government in any way they can.

Telephony is also easy to monitor with the right equipment at the central office. The sheer reality is that, due to the fact that all electromagnetic waves travel at or near the speed of light, you could have all of your traffic routed to a monitoring site, then en route to you, without you ever noticing.

Care to explain the science behind how electromagnetic waves of varying frequencies can be "rerouted" to a central location? Trillions of gamma rays, microwaves, x-rays, radio waves, etc are going to be sent to a central location where they can all be decoded and processed? What a logistical nightmare.

[pub crawler]

Originally posted by boywonder


An anonymous proxy server is just that...anonymous. The person who runs the proxy server retains (or chooses not to retain) the logs of what IP addresses were receiving what packets.

Hence, they are not anonymous.

[boywonder]

Here's a FAQ on anonymous proxies:

What is an anonymous proxy server?
Anonymous proxy servers hide your IP address and thereby prevent your from unauthorized access to your computer through the Internet. They do not provide anyone with your IP address and effectively hide any information about you and your reading interests. Besides that, they don’t even let anyone know that you are surfing through a proxy server. Anonymous proxy servers can be used for all kinds of Web-services, such as Web-Mail (MSN Hot Mail, Yahoo mail), web-chat rooms, FTP archives, etc.


It IS anonymous unless you use one that actually NOT an anonymous proxy. Of course, you conspiracy theorists out there will believe anything you want, so this arguement doesn't matter.

[nbcrusader]

Originally posted by pub crawler
Sure, why not?

Unless this is some super secret Skull & Crossbones thing (for you conspiracy theory fans), I really doubt that our current administration has this as an official or unofficial goal.

I know a pastor who was invited by the White House to provide feedback on various issues. If he had gotten any hint of this policy (which amounts to "let's trigger the Second Coming so all us good Christians will be raptured and don't have to go to work tomorrow"), he would have come unglued.

The religious right has their agenda – I don’t believe it goes this far.

[melon]

Originally posted by boywonder
Here's a FAQ on anonymous proxies:

What is an anonymous proxy server?
Anonymous proxy servers hide your IP address and thereby prevent your from unauthorized access to your computer through the Internet. They do not provide anyone with your IP address and effectively hide any information about you and your reading interests. Besides that, they don’t even let anyone know that you are surfing through a proxy server. Anonymous proxy servers can be used for all kinds of Web-services, such as Web-Mail (MSN Hot Mail, Yahoo mail), web-chat rooms, FTP archives, etc.


It IS anonymous unless you use one that actually NOT an anonymous proxy. Of course, you conspiracy theorists out there will believe anything you want, so this arguement doesn't matter.

Hello? IP addresses are more than just some identification number. An anonymous proxy server still has to receive your IP address--this is how servers and clients communicate to each other! If that particular anonymous proxy server is being monitored, though, there goes all your desires for anonymity. All an anonymous proxy server does is direct traffic through it and appear as if it is requesting the information, rather than you. This does *not* mean that the proxy server itself is not recording information about you. It just means that any site it "requests" to is not receiving your information. This will successfully thwart most amateur and intermediate hackers; but certainly not something as advanced and tenacious as the federal government.

Sorry...there is no real anonymity on the internet!

Melon

[boywonder]

Originally posted by melon


Hello? IP addresses are more than just some identification number. An anonymous proxy server still has to receive your IP address--this is how servers and clients communicate to each other! If that particular anonymous proxy server is being monitored, though, there goes all your desires for anonymity. All an anonymous proxy server does is direct traffic through it and appear as if it is requesting the information, rather than you. This does *not* mean that the proxy server itself is not recording information about you. It just means that any site it "requests" to is not receiving your information. This will successfully thwart most amateur and intermediate hackers; but certainly not something as advanced and tenacious as the federal government.

Sorry...there is no real anonymity on the internet!

Melon

That's why hackers commonly talk about "REAL" anonymous proxies. Anyone can setup a proxy with enough bandwidth. If you've ever hacked anything, then you know how to look for the right type of anonymous proxies. Give me a case where the govt. has actually seized logs from an anon. proxy.

[melon]

Originally posted by boywonder
That's why hackers commonly talk about "REAL" anonymous proxies. Anyone can setup a proxy with enough bandwidth. If you've ever hacked anything, then you know how to look for the right type of anonymous proxies. Give me a case where the govt. has actually seized logs from an anon. proxy.

Ah see...this is the difference. This thread is about *theory,* not reality. The current reality? Yes...there is a lot we can get away with. But all you need is your ISP to change its mind. A little black box hooked up to a computer at Verizon, for instance, is all the government really needs to be able to know exactly what is going on with all of Verizon's customers. If the particular proxy server is hooked up to Verizon, in this example, and is looking at suspicious sites, then, yes, the government could go after the anonymous proxy owner, and I'm sure they could coerce the owner to hook up some sort of device to track who is using it in cases for law enforcement. It doesn't take much to track where an IP address is located. There are "WHOIS" sites all over the place, and I've even used them before.

The government recently did use the "black box" to spy on one particular customer at an ISP, but, as they had admitted, the box could have been used to spy on everyone, if they had chosen to.

Have a good night, boywonder.

Melon

[boywonder]

Originally posted by melon


Ah see...this is the difference. This thread is about *theory,* not reality. The current reality? Yes...there is a lot we can get away with. But all you need is your ISP to change its mind. A little black box hooked up to a computer at Verizon, for instance, is all the government really needs to be able to know exactly what is going on with all of Verizon's customers. If the particular proxy server is hooked up to Verizon, in this example, and is looking at suspicious sites, then, yes, the government could go after the anonymous proxy owner, and I'm sure they could coerce the owner to hook up some sort of device to track who is using it in cases for law enforcement. It doesn't take much to track where an IP address is located. There are "WHOIS" sites all over the place, and I've even used them before.

The government recently did use the "black box" to spy on one particular customer at an ISP, but, as they had admitted, the box could have been used to spy on everyone, if they had chosen to.

Have a good night, boywonder.

Melon

I don't like to entertain conspiracy theorists, because they're all pretty insane to start with, but does this theory try to explain why the government would want to coerce ever anonymous proxy owner? How will they know which ones to target? How can they target all of them? The government, in my opinion, would not want to directly contact individuals (proxy servers) who may take that information and use it against them in the media. They tend to me indirect observers.

[pub crawler]

Originally posted by boywonder
Does anyone really believe that the government hasn't been able to do this in the past or hasn't been doing it to begin with? What do you think the NSA is exactly? What do you think the FBI's carnivore system is being used for? Let's not pretend that this is anything new or that our freedom in this country has ever been based upon our privacy. Our affairs can constantly be monitored and this has been true for a LONG time.

http://www.fbi.gov/hq/lab/carnivore/carnivore2.htm

boywonder, first you acknowledge that the technology that could be used to monitor the activities of private citizens has been around "for a LONG time," then you spend the rest of this thread arguing that a private person can transact on the Internet with absolute anonymity, and you appear to assert that government authorities cannot track a private citizen's Internet transactions even if they wanted to, as long as said private citizen transacts through an anonymous proxy server.

The issue here is not conspiracy theories, it's personal privacy. You argue that our freedom in not based on privacy. Very well.

[boywonder]

Carnivore is a very limited system. It cannot monitor every electromagnetic wave. I'm arguing that there are ways to bypass government spying to some extent, but they're probably capable of monitoring you if they REALLY wanted to. They could setup fake anonymous proxies, etc. The thing is, why would the government go through all that trouble to track the activity of the average citizen?

Also, why harp on the means of doing this? Isn't this just pointless speculation fueled by one too many dystopian novels being used to attack Bush.

[melon]

Originally posted by boywonder
They could setup fake anonymous proxies, etc. The thing is, why would the government go through all that trouble to track the activity of the average citizen?

To track copyright enforcement--MP3 downloading, etc.--and to watch for suspicious opinions that could be construed as leading to illegal activity.

And your constant adoration of anonymous proxies is starting to get laughable. All the government needs to do is monitor from the ISP level! Didn't you read my little post on what the government did at Verizon? There are also 13 key computers, apparently, that make up the internet backbone. If all of these go down, so will the internet. Do you not think it is easy to set up a tracking device at this level?

Also, why harp on the means of doing this? Isn't this just pointless speculation fueled by one too many dystopian novels being used to attack Bush.

I don't give a flying f*ck about partisanship with this topic. This is about privacy, which seemed to be a very Republican ideal, frankly. Hello? Even good old Phil Gramm was a co-writer of a very important privacy law in 1999 (Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act); but now we're all so ready to throw away all notions of privacy all for "security." But I'm sure the people of Iraq feel safe with their "Father" as well.

Melon

[Klaus]

Originally posted by melon


To track copyright enforcement--MP3 downloading, etc.--and to watch for suspicious opinions that could be construed as leading to illegal activity.

And worse.. once they create such a network against crime it's easy to abuse it for discrediting your political oponent.

[i](Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act); but now we're all so ready to throw away all notions of privacy all for "security." But I'm sure the people of Iraq feel safe with their "Father" as well.
Melon [/B]

That's the point - there are allwys people who favour security over privacy and vice versa. People who favour a Country with a strong Police and Secret Services just saw their chance with 9/11 to create all the laws they ever dreamed of.
(And they tend to ignore the fact that it was the mistake of humans in the Secret Services and not the lack of laws which lead to success for the terrorists.

Klaus